


brightness (the light in your eyes remix)

by zxanthe



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Ambiguity, F/F, Ladystuck Remix Treats 2016, Partial Nudity, Quadrant Confusion, ah these kids, something between red and pale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-12
Updated: 2016-07-12
Packaged: 2018-07-23 12:31:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7463439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zxanthe/pseuds/zxanthe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i> (or: you, and i, and what we could have been but never were) </i><br/>Terezi and Kanaya.</p>
            </blockquote>





	brightness (the light in your eyes remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bladeCleaner](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bladeCleaner/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Brightness](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6548578) by [bladeCleaner](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bladeCleaner/pseuds/bladeCleaner). 
  * In response to a prompt by [bladeCleaner](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bladeCleaner/pseuds/bladeCleaner) in the [Ladystuck_RemixTreats2016](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Ladystuck_RemixTreats2016) collection. 



She turns, and something in your mind slots into place.

At almost six sweeps Terezi is knife-sharp and lovely. There is a certain elegance in the abrupt and jutting curves of her collarbones. Her rumble spheres are no more than two faint, hesitant buds resting atop her ribs, every one of which you can count. The expression on her face is caught between sticky exhaustion and sharp satisfaction. Her lids have drifted halfway down her burned-out eyes. There is something vulnerable lurking in her face and yet she is utterly comfortable, unashamed of her nakedness.

Your hands pause in the act of wringing out the fabric patch.

Terezi blinks once, slowly, and sniffs once, deeply, and then she grins, wide and wicked and knowing like she does. It lasts only instant before distorting into a yawn like a meowbeast’s, extravagant and packed with needle-sharp teeth. At this your hands stir into motion again, and when Terezi’s arms slide atop your shoulders from behind you sigh.

“The law thanks you for your contribution to societal hygiene, jadeblood,” she says, and her breath is warm in your ear. “Now, I don’t have any money, so I guess I’ll have to pay you in _other_ ways.” You can hear the grin in her voice.

“I think,” you say, “that you have been viewing entirely too much erotic filmography, and not even the good kind; Sollux should really…”

You trail off because Terezi has pressed her lips to the back of your neck. They are just a shade cooler than your own temperature and a little chapped. There is something ridiculously tender in their gentle pressure, something so very achingly _pale_ that your breath catches and all of a sudden you think of Vriska and how she’s never once done something like this in the entire course of your moirallegiance.

Then Terezi runs her tongue very fast all the way up your neck and nips your ear, and you make a very undignified noise, and Terezi’s raucous grating cackles fill up the whole hive and the moment is gone. You turn around and she’s already walking towards the ablution block, the scratches on her back curiously vivid in the hazy evening light.

When she emerges some fifteen minutes later, it’s to find you sprawled in a chair, fast asleep.

 

* * *

 

It’s still nighttime when you wake. Light from the moons slants through the windows and gives the scales an eerie, subtle sort of luminescence. You stare at them, transfixed by their beauty, for almost a full minute before realizing that there is someone in your lap.

Terezi is curled against you, head nestled in the hollow between shoulder and throatstem, breaths deep and even. Occasionally she will make little noises; once she even says something that sounds suspiciously like _Vriska._ You don’t know how long you sit there, only that you’re feeling a decidedly strange combination of exasperation and tenderness. She’s still wearing her glasses. Delicately, you pluck them from her face, and tuck a quantity of hair behind her ear for good measure. You want to chide her for falling asleep in your lap; her recuperacoon is a scant few steps from where you sit. You want to shake her, wake her, tell her _stop_ or _we can’t keep doing this_ or _what is this thing growing between us?_ You want to hate her, because Vriska will never, ever look at you the way you wish she would, not with this sharp wild knife of a girl beside her. You want to press your lips to her half-open mouth.

Terezi stirs against you. One hand comes up and closes around your shoulder. “Kanaya,” she mumbles.

Your breath catches in your throat. But Terezi gives a great grunting snore and her hand relaxes its grip and you are left sitting in the chair with your teeth clenched, feeling almost as if you want to cry.

Instead, you gather her up in your arms as gently as possible and stand. You almost fall as a wave of pins and needles sweep down your legs. Terezi doesn’t seem to notice anything, still slumbering blissfully in your grasp. Gingerly, you make your way through the maze of scalemates and law books and chalk drawings until you’ve arrived at her recuperacoon. When you look down, Terezi’s eyes are open and she’s smiling at you, a wry quirk of her lips devoid of teeth.

“Oh, Miss Mint Julep,” she says softly, and you close your eyes, unable to look at her. A moment later something brushes against your face. “Now why are you crying?”

You sigh and shake your head. Terezi wriggles from your grasp and a moment later you feel her hands, thin and clever and quick, on your shoulders, in your hair, stroking with an uncharacteristic sort of tenderness. You know Terezi can’t quite bring herself to say it aloud, but the apology, utterly sincere and utterly remorseless, is there in her caresses. So you pull her close and rest your chin atop her head and breathe deeply.

After a while, Terezi pulls away. There is a thoughtful gleam in her sightless eyes. She rises up on her tiptoes and presses her lips to yours for a span of several heartbeats before climbing into her recuperacoon and disappearing beneath the slime.

You have no idea what you two are on about. None at all.

 

* * *

 

The end of all things finds the two of you in the meadow. Above, the gods frolic and swoop through the bright blue sky, and the sound of their laughter spirals down to you on the warm breeze.

“I think,” you tell her, “that it’s such bullshit that we are among the only people in our group that cannot fly.”

“Objection, Miss Mint Julep!” Terezi grins, and there’s a crackle of ozone as she pulls her dragon wing rockets out of her sylladex and straps them to her shoulders. “ _You_ are among those in our group that cannot fly. I am simply content to watch.”

You roll your eyes and sigh, but a smile tugs at the corners of your lips all the same. For a while, you watch Rose and Roxy and Vriska as they chase each other through the air. Even from here you can hear Karkat’s curses as he clings white-knuckled to Dave, who carries him bridal-style in his arms. John sprawls on his back, languid and lazy, and when Vriska comes zooming towards him he sends her tumbling with a well-placed gust of wind, his laughter cutting off in an “oof!” as she slams into him with a vengeance. When you glance over at Terezi her expression is the same as it was that night all those sweeps ago, when you were young and uncertain and clutching her in your arms, lips quirked in a small smile and something almost tender lurking in her features. At almost seven and a half sweeps Terezi Pyrope is still knife-sharp and skinny, but after everything that’s happened there is a weariness to her, a curve. She does not look vulnerable, sitting there in the sun with her half-lidded eyes; she looks like someone teetering on some indefinable edge, and it is this, perhaps, that makes you reach forward and place your hand on her shoulder.

Terezi’s eyes flutter closed, and the breath comes out of her in an almost inaudible sigh. “Oh, Miss Maryam,” she says. “You worry entirely too much.”

“Perhaps,” you say. “But sometimes I just can’t help myself.”

Terezi smiles.


End file.
